Miniature Cows: A New Way to Desensitize Children to Animal Killing
A disturbing trend has taken hold in England - to combat rising food prices, people are raising miniature cows in their back yards for meat and for milk. The cows are the size of a German Shepherd, and are slaughtered when they are two years old. One family with four cows says, "they’ve been hugely popular with the children."
What will happen when the children see the cows being sent off to slaughter, by their own parents? They will be taught to accept the deaths of these cows they once considered their companions. And they will be fed the flesh of their companions.
Is raising cows in the back yard any worse than buying meat in a supermarket, or hunting? Yes and no. In all three examples, an animal is being killed for human consumption. But most people who hunt or buy meat would not eat their own companion animals, and slaughtering miniature cows who are effectively companions in the back yard teaches children a new level of desensitization to animal killing.
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I swear, what will people do next. I cannot believe that people are so heartless when it comes to animals. This just outrages me, like everything else about how humans treat animals.
Sorry, but I couldn’t disagree more with your assessment of the “mini-cow.” Reconnecting with the reality about where meat comes from–and raising it themselves–will make people MORE sensitive to animals! It’s today’s disconnected-from-life, plastic-wrapped + sterilized supermarket meat packaging that enables the large-scale cruelty of factory farms to continue. It is not DESENSITIZATION that is responsible for the staggering scale of today’s animal cruelty, it is quite the opposite–the animals and their deaths are hidden from people so they don’t have to think about them. It’s about time that this process became more transparent so we can stop our collective denial that food animals exist!
Thanks for your thoughts, Kate. I do agree that people need to see where meat and animal products come from, but I hope that they learn this lesson in a way that does not teach people to accept it.
I’d like to add another thought.
As a girl, I was a member of a local 4H club and years later, my children also were involved in 4H. Living in a rural community, many children participated in the raising and caring for animals that would be “judged” in a competition.
Back then as well as today, many of these animals that were hand-raised by children, go on to the market. That is very disturbing to me and I thought incredibly sad.
Some of my family members are farmers. Perhaps they get “used” to the idea of what happens to certain creatures at a young age? That certain animals are here on earth for one specific reason. I hear that all the time. But when someone spends an inordinate amount of time caring and raising an animal from birth, I would think it would be extremely difficult knowing it would be killed.
Speaking of sensitivity about animals, please let’s not refer to them as “it,” as two of the previous commentors have done. Just as you (hopefully) would not refer to a child or other person as “it,” nonhuman animals are sentient beings, not inanimate objects. Let’s refer to them as such.
And yes, raising animals at home to be killed for food is a terrible way to educate people about them. For one of many things, how many people are skilled enough to kill an animal without causing the animal terror, pain and suffering? It is no easy task. Again, that is just one of many, many reasons why it should not be done. See: http://www.animalplace.org/5h.html
And yes, raising animals at home to be killed for food is a terrible way to educate people about it. For one of many things, how many people are skilled enough to kill an animal without causing he or she terror, pain and suffering? It is no easy thing. There are humane ways to educate people about it. See also: http://www.animalplace.org/5h.html
video posted on Wall Street Journal site:
http://tinyurl.com/555j8k
and: http://tinyurl.com/6q3ll9
Morning Edition, August 13, 2008 · As the economy slows, businesses are cutting back, including cattle farmers. They’re downsizing as feed becomes more expensive. But they’re not shrinking their herds. They’re shrinking the cows.
The Wall Street Journal reports that mini cattle are a small but growing trend. The waist-high breeds are less than half the weight of an average cow, and they eat one-third less feed – but they can have full-size attitudes.
First of all I would like to thank Kate for bringing some perpective and rational thought into this otherwise pathetic discussion.
If more people would raise their own meat, we wouldn’t have half the issues that plague the world. It wasn’t all that long ago that even those living in town raised chickens for eggs and meat. Anyone who has been around chickens will quickly realize why this isn’t all that common anymore. Unfortunately, today too many people are too far removed from the food chain. There are those which only care that they can find their meat neatly wrapped in the supermarket and don’t give a second thought as to how or where from which it came. Then there are the “do-gooders” equally removed reality, and ruled by misguided emotions, stating how evil we all are, while they gobble down the dollar double cheese burger picked up at the fast food joint down the road, diving their SUV alone, complaining about the price of gas and food, with a trunk full of groceries wrapped in plastic and Styrofoam, believing that the oil companies are going to be the end of our society. Good grief where has all the common since gone?
Those that don’t eat meat at all, not that I agree with them, IMO are the only ones that have a legitimate leg to stand on. As long as they keep that opinion to themselves and not try and push it on me, all is good.
Here is a fine example of people getting back to reality and closer to nature. A little exercise in becoming a little more self sufficient instead of looking to some large governmental body to give them a hand out, and we have people crying about it. Home grown food is the best you can come buy. You know EXACTLY what the animal has eaten and can control the diet of the in ways large farms can not. Want a leaner cut of meat, or maybe a little more tender. You have the control of at what age, what feed, how fast weight is put on, and what breed you will raise.
It is very odd how some will cry about animal treatment on large farms and then condemn those that find viable alternatives. What I find odd is how is people will find it morally acceptable to eat meat as long as someone else has done all the work. It is a sad commentary on today’s society and on how weak people have become.
John you said it perfectly……….. No fear of hormones added, no threat of e.coli contamination before the meat is packaged and put in freezers for distributed.
Really? are you serious. children raised on a farm deal with death since they day they are born it is no problem and not at all a inhumane thing to do. This is a valuable lesson for the child that will no doubly help them though out their entire life! I absolutely having animals around to slaughter when I have children just like my parents did for me.